Efficiency Analysis of Tomato Crop in Egypt: A Case Study

Abstract

Tomatoes are one of the primary vegetable crops in Egypt in terms of cultivated area and are among the most important food commodities. Therefore, it is essential to focus on improving economic and productive efficiency, stabilizing the crop supply, and enhancing its quality. and ensure fair pricing for both producers and consumers. This has necessitated the focus on estimating the efficiency of selected tomato farms. This objective was achieved using the Data Envelopment Analysis (DEAP) method to estimate the technical, allocative, and economic efficiency of the farms in the study sample, which included 66 farms, divided into three categories based on farm size. The results of the study indicated that the technical efficiency indicators, under both constant and variable returns to scale, were higher in the second category of farm size compared to the first and third categories, with the average scale efficiency of the second category reaching 91%, while the averages for the first and third categories were approximately 76% and 77%, respectively. Additionally, economic efficiency in the third category outperformed the first, suggesting that as the cultivated area increases, economic efficiency also improves. The study recommends guiding farmers to follow technical recommendations for tomato production to reduce costs and increase profits. It also suggests investigating the factors that contributed to achieving the highest economic efficiency in some tomato farms and adopting these as practical models for less efficient farms to achieve the highest possible efficiency. Furthermore, it encourages farmers to expand the cultivated areas for tomato production.